My first wood purchase arrived today!

This is the first time I’ve purchase wood online, and the first time I bought anything but pine. I wanted to make simple window shelves on brackets for my cats to sit on. I realized I didn’t want to look at big box store pine shelving every day (I’m laying knotty pine floors – I didn’t want more pine) so I looked on ebay and bought these. Excuse the crappy looking living room floor, I haven’t even put down the new subfloor in this room yet. The walnut boards (two) are live edge, approx. 71” x 22” x 3/4”. Don’t know what I’ll do yet, leaning towards simple benches with store bought screw in legs until later, when I have the skills to do something nice with them. Until I’m ready to work on them, I rewrapped them and layed cinder blocks on them to keep them flat. Is this ok?I know there are a lot of pics of the same thing, but I’m mezmerized by the pattern in the wood. I don’t know if I’ve ever even seen walnut before…very excited!!

Congratulations on your first purchase of hardwood. I have spent the first couple years of this hobby on nothing but pine, so I can definitely understand your enthusiasm. Very nice slabs of Black Walnut there. I can tell you from experience that the first purchase makes you want to put them in a safe somewhere and use them when you think of the most wonderful project in the world to use them for :) Wonderful to be conservative in your wood usage but be careful on being too frugal or those pieces will sit for a long time ;)

David

-- There is little that is simple when it comes to making a simple box.

Thanks everybody! I feel stupid, getting so excited like a ten year old at Christmas, but everyone here is so considerate of newbies. It’s refreshing.
I have to ask – what does “get them stickered” mean?
I got the wood off ebay. I have no idea what is a fair price, but I think it’s whatever you are willing to spend – lol. My friend thinks it was high, her brother says it wasn’t. I don’t know what live edge black walnut goes for per board foot, but the two pieces were about $95.00. The sellers were fantasticlly nice and helpful, and even sent me an extra live edge piece about 12” x 14” to experiment with when I mentioned I’d never worked with walnut before.
I think I’m madly in love with black walnut…
Oh, and if I had the room (I live in a mobile home) I’d make a bookmatched table for myself, the heck with the cats! I wish I had the space : (

Vasko, you’ve been ripped off. In pic #5 I can see obvious patterns of wavy grain right there in the middle of the long grain patterns. Being the nice guy I am(and fair too), I’ll pay you 10c on the dollar to take that off yer hands. LOL!

LOL! Rance, when I started to read your post, my face fell and my heart broke! All I read was “ripped off”. Thanks for waking me up, better than my coffee…
Sad thing is, you could actually do something with this wood. I just bought it ‘cause it was pretty ; )

~22 bf (prob less because of the curves) of curly walnut? (~$4/bf) I’d say thats a fair price. Depending on how you cut it up (or don’t), you’ll have some waste.. but

Stickering is putting thin strips of wood between the boards to help them dry evenly and resist warping. Since they were shipped, you might have a humidity difference and the boards will need to adjust. Being so big and only 3/4, the boards might move quite a bit. Its probably more subjective than anything else, but thats what I would do, then maybe throw some small sandbags on top to weigh them all down.

The other thing that works in favor of a table is the one edge thats almost straight. I’d consider cutting off the bottom where if flares out and then butt the two boards up to each other so that you have somewhat of an oval-ish table. You could use the cutoffs as legs and then flip that sucker for a good price.

That is some nice looking wood. Also, Welcome Cindy! Great to have you here. Don’t worry too much about what to do with it. You’ll think of something. We were all newbies once, (I still am) but trial and error and info from places like this is how we learn and get better. One word of advice though is be aware of where you purchased the wood and where you live. Humidity is different in different parts of the country and you’ll want to let the wood acclimate to your conditions. For example, if you live in Arizona and the wood came from Oregon, the moisture content is probably going to be higher and will need to dry a little to even out in Arizona. So, the good news is you can admire your wood for a few weeks. And “Stickering your wood” just means put small strips of wood under the pieces and between the pieces so that air can circulate around them and help them meet that moisture equilibrium. Just make sure the strips are the same height so they don’t warp your boards. Good Luck!

Flip it! Heavens no! lol I’m greedy, I want it all for myself ; )The wood is KD, and I put cinder blocks on them to keep them flat – but I didn’t know about putting slips of wood between them. I hope I don’t have to cut them up much, I’ll inspect the ends for checks and see what I may have to trim. I’m hoping to keep them as intact as possible, to get the maximum visual impact of the pattern in the boards.I’m in the Appalchian mountains of Virginia, the wood came from Iowa…I really lilke these sellers, and I’m going to be a regular buyer if the next batch looks this nice.

LOL – Good points! But first I have to a) learn to understand wood properties, and b) learn how to make something stable that won’t blow apart in a few years. So I can get that good reputation ; )I’m looking forward to the day I can flip things, but I’m in no hurry.